When plotting a murder (figuratively speaking), the mystery writer has at hand any number of M.O.s, including such tried and true conventions as the locked room, the unbreakable alibi, the double bluff, and the mistaken identity. Now, in Murderous Schemes, renowned mystery writers Donald E. Westlake and J. Madison Davis offer an illuminating look at eight such mystery conventions, illustrating each with four short stories written by some of the masters of the form. The resulting collection of thirty-two tales spans a hundred and fifty years of crime fiction and includes virtually every style imaginable, from the hard-boiled detective story to the cozy armchair mystery.

Here Westlake and Davis provide the avid mystery reader (and the budding mystery writer) with a glimpse behind the curtain, allowing them to compare for themselves how some of the great crime writers worked their magic on a particular convention. These tales highlight not only differences between individual writers, but also the differences between American and British detective fiction, and they illuminate the evolution of crime writing over time. Here is a glorious treasure chest of tales that cover every crime in the book, written by a who's who of crime fiction--Edgar Allan Poe, Wilkie Collins, Arthur Conan Doyle, G. K. Chesterton, Raymond Chandler, Dorothy L. Sayers, Chester Himes, Edward D. Hoch, and Lawrence Block, to name but a few.

Bringing together a century and a half of superb crime stories, Murderous Schemes is a glorious collection that will inform and delight anyone who loves mystery and mayhem.

Contents:

The Locked Room

The Shadow of the Goat (1926) by John Dickson Carr

What, No Butler? (1933) by Damon Runyon

The Leopold Locked Room (1971) by Edward D. Hoch

The Man Who Read John Dickson Carr (1965) by William Brittain

Only One Among You

The Secret Garden (1910) by G.K. Chesterton

The Necklace of Pearls (1933) by Dorothy L. Sayers

They Can Only Hang You Once (1932) by Dashiell Hammett

Busted Blossoms (1986) by Stuart M. Kaminsky

The Caper

A Costume Piece (1896) by E.W. Hornung

The Impossible Theft (1964) by John F. Suter

Donít Know Much About Art (1984) by Simon Brett

The Ultimate Caper (1975) by Donald E. Westlake

The Armchair Detective

The Mysterious Death on the Underground Railway (1901) by Baroness Emmuska Orczy

The Blue Geranium (1929) by Agatha Christie

The Adventure of Abraham Lincolnís Clue (1965) by Ellery Queen

The Affair of the Twisted Scarf (1950) by Rex Stout

Come Into My Parlor

The Landlady (1959) by Roald Dahl

The Orderly World of Mr. Appleby (1950) by Stanley Ellin

Bless This House (1970) by Christianna Brand

Someday Iíll Plant More Walnut Trees> (1993) by Lawrence Block

I Confess!

ďThou Art the ManĒ (1844) by Edgar Allan Poe

The Adventure of the Dying Detective (1913) by Arthur Conan Doyle

The Master of Mystery (1902) by Jack London

The Fat Man (1975) by Isak Dinesen

Hoist on their Own Petards

Midnight in Beauchamp Row by Anna Katharine Green

Iíll Be Waiting (1939) by Raymond Chandler

The Possibility of Evil (1965) by Shirley Jackson

The Secret Lover (1985) by Peter Lovesey

Over the Edge

A Jury of Her Peers (1917) by Susan Glaspell

The Hands of Mr. Ottermole (1929) by Thomas Burke

Tang (1967) by Chester Himes

Little Apple Hard to Peel (1942) by Fredric Brown

Original title: Murderous Schemes: An Anthology of Classic Detective StoriesOriginal languages:
English